this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2024
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Mildly Interesting

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[Image description: a perfectly round peeled bulb of garlic on a cutting board, with unpeeled normal cloves behind it.]

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[–] kylie_kraft 57 points 6 months ago (49 children)
[–] [email protected] 33 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (48 children)

Here is another mildy interesting fact, in Swedish we group onions and garlic together by using the word "lök" with a color and different spacing to differentiate them:

"lök" - onion

"gul lök" - onion or yellow onion

"rödlök" - red onion

"vitlök" - garlic

We never talk about "vit lök", it doesn't really exist as a concept in Swedish, but we have more types of "lök"...

"gräslök" directly translates to "grass onion", but the proper translation is "chives"

"prujolök" is the Swedish name for "leek"

[–] [email protected] 30 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (3 children)

Garlic, onions, chives, and leeks (plus shallots, spring onions / scallions, and ramsons) are actually very closely related, being part of the same allium genus. ~~That's the same level of closeness as dogs to wolves, for example~~ my example is bad, see AlotOfReading below

[–] AlotOfReading 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Dogs and wolves are the same species (Canis Lupus), not just members of the same genus. Genus Allium is much bigger than genus Canis (over 800 species) and its members are much less closely related to each other. The common food species are at least evolutionary cousins though, unlike other parts of the category. The onions and chives all share subgenus Cepa, while garlic and leeks are off in subgenus Allium.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

Ahh, I think I was misled by reading Canis familiaris. Thanks for the correction

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